Parental alienation involves the systematic brainwashing, poisoning and manipulation of children with the sole purpose of destroying a loving and warm relationship they once shared with a parent. My story involves this form of child abuse & exploring the bias favouring a mother in the social ecosystem around Family Law.

I have met and heard the tragic stories of many parents. PA is a function, by and large, of a custodial ex-partner, although some alienation can start while the couple is still together.

This blog is a story of experiences and observations of dysfunctional Family Law (FLAW), an arena pitting parent against parent, with children as the prize. Due to the gender bias in Family Law, that I have observed, this Blog has evolved from a focus solely on PA to one of the broader Family/Children's Rights area and the impact of Feminist mythology on Canadian Jurisprudence and the Divorce Industry.

Thursday, April 9, 2009

In "Oklahoma Legislator Wants to Give Pregnant Women a License to Kill," I briefly discussed the inaccurate impression left by a KOCO report on a bill being offered by Rep. Mike Thompson. The KOCO report quoted a YWCA representative, Josh Beasley who claimed that "domestic violence is the second leading cause of death to (pregnant) women nationwide." In emails I pointed out the extreme inaccuracy of that statement and that it would create a misimpression among KOCO's readers and listeners if not corrected. Neither KOCO nor Mr. Beasley chose to correct the record.

So I will.

In 1987, the Centers for Disease Control started gathering statistics on the causes of death among pregnant women and those who die within one year following birth or termination of a pregnancy. A study of that data, published in the American Journal of Public Health shows that, from 1991-1999, a total of 4,200 deaths to these mothers were "pregnancy related," meaning in some way caused by the pregnancy (Am. J. Public Health, 2005; 95, 471-477). Of those, 1,933 deaths were due to injuries, or about 215 per year. And of those injury-related deaths, 879 were due to car accidents and 617 were homicides. So, over the time studied, about 67 pregnant women per year were the victims of homicide related to their pregnancies.

Deaths to pregnant women were overwhelmingly caused by factors other than homicide. Well over half were attributed to "complications of pregnancy."

To give some perspective, about six million women become pregnant in this country every year. Of those, about 467 die for any reason related to their pregnancies.

But of course, none of the above prevented various news outlets and NOW from totally misrepresenting the facts. NOW, for example ran an article headlined "Murder: The Leading Cause of Death for Pregnant Women (NOW, 4/23/03)." Well, no actually it's not. In fact, homicide made up 8.4% of the total. About 43% of deaths were not pregnancy-related. Of those that were, 54% were due to complications of pregnancy.

In 2005 and again in 2007, ABC News chipped in with some misrepresentations of its own. In the latter article, citing the Journal of Public Health study referred to above, ABC News informed its readers that "31% of all pregnancy deaths between 1991 and 1999 were the result of homicide." Again, no they weren't. Thirty-one percent of deaths due to injuries were homicides. As stated above, that's a small percentage of the total.

And, in the KOCO piece, it's exactly that qualifier - due to injuries - that Josh Beasley omitted. That qualifier of course makes all the difference in the world. It's the difference between 2,276 deaths in a nine-year period and 617 deaths.

As we've seen so often, selling news can be more important than reporting facts. And it seems there's nothing to grab headlines like another false claim of female victimization.

Favourite Quotes

“The job of a father is this : to help his children develop, to teach them to express and master their emotions; to avoid physiological distress, to provide a context for their experiences; to help them persevere, reach their goals and take on responsibilities; and to instil the roles of citizen, partner and parent. In short, it is to fill their bellies with bread, their brains with wisdom and their hearts with love and courage.” Camil Bouchard, “On Father’s Ground” 2002.

Some men see things as they are and say, "Why?" I dream of things that never were and say, "Why not?" ~ George Bernard Shaw ~ also quoted by Robert F. Kennedy, US Senator and Presidential Candidate assassinated in 1968.

Happiness makes up in height for what it lacks in length. ~ Robert Frost

First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win. - Mahatma Gandhi

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Some Gems on relationships

Marriage is a relationship in which one person is always right, and the other is a husband.

The motto of this Father's Rights Activist

"It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood who strives valiantly, who errs and comes short again and again ... and who, at the worst, if he fails at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat." Theodore Roosevelt,

Facts on violence in Canada Domestic and Otherwise

Family violence in Canada: A statistical profile, 2009.

Of the nearly 19 million Canadians who had a current or former spouse in 2009, 6.2% or 1.2 million reported they had been victimized physically or sexually by their partner or spouse during the five years prior to the survey. This proportion was stable from 2004 (6.6%), the last time the victimization survey was conducted, and down from 1999 (7.4%).

A similar proportion of men and women reported experiencing spousal violence during the five years prior to the survey. Among men, 6.0% or about 585,000, encountered spousal violence during this period, compared with 6.4% or 601,000 women.

Total 611, men 465, women 146Rate of homicides with firearms has increased 24% since 2002. Handgun use on increase (gangs don't register their weapons)Women victims 24% - lowest proportion everMen Victims 76%Both the rate of females killed (0.87 per 100,000 population), as well as the proportion(24%), were the lowest since 196162 spousal homicides - no change from 2007Lowest rate in 40 years45 women 17 (27.4%)men

Many DV homicides of men are not classified as such and this number is higher than 27.4%.

In 2009 based on a million couples it can fairly be said 999,998 wives do not kill their husbands and 999,995 husbands do not kill their wives. (See Pg. 15 chart modified from the rate per 100,000.)

In 2009, 49 women and 15 men were killed by a current or former spouse (excludes one same-sex spousal victim).

Total homicides 610, Men 450. Gang related 20.3 percent.69.1 % of firearm related deaths involved handgunsWomen 160, In 2009 it represented the second lowest proportion (26%) of female homicide victims since data were first collected. The rate of female victims has generally been declining since the late 1960s.

Profile

I am Politically active and right of centre on most issues with the odd exception such as legalization of "Mary Jane".
I advocate on changes to Family Law - an incredibly dysfunctional arena where parents are pitted against one another and children are the victims.
My picture will sometimes show me as a younger man simply because I like them.

An Alienated Child

Is a troubled child

American Coalition for Fathers & Children Petition

A quote by a well known Canadian Jurist

The Honorable Justice John Gomery of Canada stated, “Hatred is not an emotion that comes naturally to a child. It has to be taught. A parent who would teach a child to hate the other parent represents a grave and persistent danger to the mental and emotional health of that child.”

(The above quote arises from PSM vs. AJC, a decision rendered by Mr. Justice John Gomery on February 15 1991 (SCM 500-12-184613895), and confirmed by the unanimous judgment of the Court of Appeal on June 14 1991, the trial judge was confronted by a case involving four children caught up in a heated custody battle between their parents whereby the children became "catastrophically" alienated from their mother.)A good paper on PAS for lawyers by a lawyer, Anne-France Goldwater (Avocate), and excerpts from the above trial are located here.